


Genuine Happiness

by goodfish_bowl



Series: DP Side Hoes Week 2021 [2]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Gen, No Plot/Plotless, but it gets better by the end i swear, just feels, kinda sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-14 04:41:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29911575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodfish_bowl/pseuds/goodfish_bowl
Summary: Sam struggled to find happiness most of her life, until it came it her one day in the 8th-grade.
Series: DP Side Hoes Week 2021 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2199054
Kudos: 19





	Genuine Happiness

Sam wasn’t exactly sure what she wanted in her future. Hell, she wasn’t sure what she wanted right now. But she knew one thing for certain, she wasn’t happy with it. Sam _supposedly_ had everything she had ever wanted, anything material that was. Her parents were dotting, too dotting, expecting her to be their perfect little girl, blonde hair and pink frilly dresses. Sam wasn’t happy with that either. She didn’t want them to dote on her, so she dyed her hair black and dove head-first into the goth aesthetic. Her parents had indulged her, despite their complaints that it was inappropriate. They wanted their little girl to be happy. 

Sam didn’t want the fake happiness her parents had, or the other pretty girls in pink dresses had. They were always so scared of losing it, that fake happiness and cheer. It was so fragile, too. Anything from a bad hair day to a single misstep could shatter their air-blown happiness. Sam didn’t want anything fake, she wanted something solid and real, something sturdy and durable, something deep and true that she would feel with her entire being. But no matter what she indulged herself in, she couldn’t find it. She couldn’t find _real happiness._

Sam was a goth now. Goths were all doom and gloom, black and violet, and most definitely didn’t care what the other kids in the hall said about them, no matter how much it hurt. Goths didn’t do _happy._ She should be disgusted by the word, revulsed by it, yet she longed for that elated feeling. But, if she couldn’t be happy, shouldn’t she at least try to make sure others were? Sam became an activist and vegan. Animals deserved to be happy too, even if she couldn’t.

Sam did some deep soul searching, wondering about herself and others around her. How could someone be happy? There was so much wrong with the world, so much suffering, so much fake joy to cover up real tears. Then along came 8th-grade year.

Sam had met two boys, one who she recognized, the other she didn’t. Everyone knew who Danny Fenton was. He had been getting shoved into small spaces by Dash Baxter since elementary. He was the son of the town kooks, the Fentons, who ran around in brightly colored jumpsuits and covered people in weird green goo that was very difficult to wash out. Her parents had warned her time and time again not to get within a mile of any of the Fentons, it could ruin them. But the Fentons, the parents at least, always seemed so happy.

No matter what people said about the Fentons, no matter what people did to them, the Fenton parents were always so happy. They were so unlike her own parents, their happiness was _real,_ not fake. They were untouchable. All of their happiness, whether embarrassing their children, or covering someone in goo, or running around town in their massive armored RV, was bona fide.

Sam wanted that.

That’s what drove her to approach nervous, bullied, pale, and skinny Danny Fenton, who looked anything but happy. He looked downright miserable, but yet his parents were the utter definition of happy. His older sister Jazz was considered a prodigy in anything academic. His parents were brilliant, despite everything else about them. Yet, Danny was strikingly unexceptional. The only thing exceptional about him was that he was unexceptionally miserable. So Sam decided to join him and his weird nerd friend, Tucker.

Tucker was smart too but chose not to stand out. A genius with anything tech-related, however, the number of times Sam had seen him flirt with anything feminine, including herself a few times until he learned otherwise. Tucker’s life, unlike her and Danny’s, was relatively plain. He wasn’t rich and was relatively ordinary overall. Yet he and Danny had been friends since elementary. Tucker was happy too, not like the Fentons, but satisfied with his life.

Sam decided Danny and Tucker weren’t all that bad. Both were genuine, either miserably or satisfied. They liked to talk about all sorts of things once they opened up to her, mostly video games, and when pressed, whatever new tech Danny’s parents had manufactured this time. Her parents didn’t like the fact that she had befriended Danny, protested boldly against it, in fact. But she wanted this. She wanted to find out how to be happy.

Then one day she was. Sam forgot what the topic was they were talking about. Something utterly mundane and completely ridiculous, but it broke her down completely. She burst out laughing right in the middle of the cafeteria. Something warm blossomed in her chest, coming into full bloom, filling her with life, forcefully breathing it into her lungs. She felt untouchable, despite the stares everyone was giving her. They couldn’t as much as phase her anymore. 

Sam was happy, right there in the middle of the cafeteria, laughing at something stupid with her two closest, only friends. 

Finally.

**Author's Note:**

> I kinda like this one. It's pretty short compared to most of what I write, but yet again, this is fine. It doesn't have to be long to get its point across. I'm not telling a story with this one, I'm telling an experience.


End file.
